( trudeau's position on the issue is getting more and more confusing by the minute , in another article it says he is in support of a quebec long gun registry but also says federal one was failed policy , i don't know getting confusing )

Trudeau targeted over gun registry flip-flop

By Jessica Murphy, QMI Agency

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Liberal leadership hopeful Justin Trudeau said Monday in Quebec he'd vote to restore the very same long-gun registry he called "a failure" Friday in Ontario.

As a group, Liberal members of Parliament, including leadership hopefuls Trudeau, Marc Garneau and Joyce Murray, decided after the long-gun registry was killed last spring that they would not seek to revive it. Garneau, Murray and some other Liberal MPs confirmed that decision again on Monday.

On Friday, Trudeau, at a campaign stop in the eastern Ontario town of Hawkesbury, was asked about his position on the controversial registry and replied, "I do see that the long-gun registry, as it was, was a failure and I am not going to resuscitate that."

( this article explains things in more detail , in favour of one for quebec ? but not rest of country ? i think his advisors are not is smart as he thinks they are )

Justin Trudeau scrambles to explain gun registry stance

Published on Monday December 03, 2012

Ryan Remiorz/THE CANADIAN PRESS Liberal leadership candidate Justin Trudeau talks with shoppers at a mall in Saint-Jean-Sur-Richelieu, Que., on Monday.

The Canadian Press

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ST-JEAN-SUR-RICHELIEU, QUE.—Justin Trudeau scrambled to explain his stance on gun control Monday as the Liberal leadership candidate took flak from opposing sides on the divisive issue.

The presumed Liberal front-runner tried to mollify both sides of the debate, rekindled over the weekend by his description of the long-gun registry as a failed policy.

Trudeau spent a news scrum with reporters handling one of the first divisive policy debates to have erupted during his campaign.

He explained that he hadn’t actually flip-flopped on the gun registry.

In fact, Trudeau said, he always supported it, and still does support it in principle. But he said now that it’s gone it’s too divisive to try bringing it back.

In the next breath, however, Trudeau added that he supports Quebec’s effort to bring it back in that province because he said the measure is not divisive there.

Finally, he explained why the long-gun registry fit his definition of a “failed” public policy.

“I voted to keep the firearms registry a few months ago and if we had a vote tomorrow I would vote once again to keep the long-gun registry,” Trudeau told reporters.

“However, the definition of a failed public policy is the fact that the long-gun registry is no more. . . . The fact is, because it was so deeply divisive for far too many people, it no longer exists.”

Trudeau repeated that definition of a failed public policy, in both English and French. He said he would rather spend the next three years, before the federal election, trying to find evidence-based policies that will unite Canadians and not divide them.

A reporter asked Trudeau about Quebec’s legal fight to keep its portion of the registry and he replied: “I find it’s a very good idea. Because in Quebec it was not at all as divisive as it was elsewhere in the country,” Trudeau said.

“Perhaps a solution is to let provinces find different solutions. What’s important is protecting Quebecers from gun violence.”

Meanwhile, Trudeau was being blasted Monday by people inside and outside his political party. One of his critics included a former Liberal justice minister.

Martin Cauchon, who is still pondering whether to run for the leadership himself, told The Canadian Press that leadership contenders need to show they’ll stand up for Liberal principles and values.

And he said the controversial registry, created by the government of Jean Chrétien in which Cauchon served, is an important part of the party’s legacy.

“I believe that we have to update our policies and make sure that next election we’re going to be able to show leadership to Canadians,” Cauchon said in an interview.

“But, you know what, I believe as well . . . that a candidate running should have the backbone to respect and stand for the principles that we have always stood for.”

Cauchon said party renewal shouldn’t mean Liberals have to turn their backs on accomplishments such as the Charter of Rights, official bilingualism or even the gun registry.

“I do hope that the starting point for our party will be to respect key values and key principles and, to me, the gun registry is an important one . . . I can’t imagine having one single candidate in our racing saying the gun registry — what was the term that he used? — a failure.”

Cauchon said the registry was an important part of the Chrétien government’s efforts to make the country a safer place. He noted it was supported by police chiefs as a key policing tool.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government killed the registry and destroyed all the data in it — except in Quebec, where the provincial government has gone to court to prevent destruction of the records.

Cauchon acknowledged there were some problems getting the registry off the ground initially, including ballooning costs, although he disputed the $1 billion estimate. But he said it was working well by the time Harper scrapped it.

Cauchon said he believes the registry should be re-created in a manner that will “not compromise the safety of our communities or the security of our people.”

He also blasted Trudeau for suggesting last week, in remarks to local Liberals in Hawkesbury, Ont., that gun ownership is an “important facet of Canadian identity” and “part of the culture of Canada.”

“The point is pretty simple. We’re not living in the (United) States,” where Americans have a constitutional right to bear arms.

“We’re building a different society.”

Cauchon said Canada has taken the approach that gun ownership should be “circumscribed” by regulations to ensure safety. He called it a sensible compromise between those who advocate unrestricted gun ownership and those who would ban them altogether.

This seems to be a little test-match between the journalists, and The Candidate ... they joust, as in a contest rather than where the stakes are real. The great burden of The Candidate is that of consistency ... he must not just be logical, but he ought not to have changed his position over time.

The test seems to be to show how little you have changed over the years, how you've been right in the past, are right now, and no doubt, will be right in the future ...

Cosmo ... what would a decade on the back benches of the third party do to develop 'leadership' in Trudeau fils?

His father developed his leadership skills in the fern bars and faculty lounges of Montreal, and Justin has taken the same path. Except for the faculty lounges.

Sorry, but I think the young Mr. Sinclair-Trudeau is a political naif, like his mother -- and the chances of a 'maturing' into some kind of statesman isn't likely.

His significance lies in the people who are behind him. I have previously described him as the 'hood ornament' on an emerging political machine ... and, if so, how much will it matter than he's only a normal person?

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